Clinical Efficacy of DC and CIK Immunotherapy Combined with Chemotherapy and Its Impact on Treg Cells in Newly Diagnosed Multiple Myeloma / 中国实验血液学杂志

ABSTRACT

<p><b>OBJECTIVE</b>To investigate the clinical efficacy and immune mechanism of immunotherapy of dendritic cells (DC) and cytokine-induced killer cell (CIK) combined with chemotherapy in patients with newly diagnosed multiple myeloma (MM).</p><p><b>METHODS</b>twenty-two newly diagnosed MM patients were chosen and divided into two groups, out of them,12 patients in single chemotherapy group were treated by chemotherapy only, 10 patients in combined group were treated by adoptive immunotherapy (DC-CIK) combined with chemotherapy. Using flow cytometry, the CD4 Treg cells in the peripheral blood of 22 MM patients were detected before and after treatment. And the clinical outcomes between two groups were also compared.</p><p><b>RESULTS</b>After treatment the overall response rate(ORR) of patients in the single chemotherapy group was 50% (6/12), among them 2 cases were in complete remission (CR) (16.67%), 2 cases very good partial remission (VGPR) (16.67%), 2 cases were in partial remission (PR) (16.67%). However, the ORR of patients in immunotherapy combined with chemotherapy group was 70.% (7/10), including in 3 cases of CR (30%), 2 cases of VGPR (20%), 2 cases of PR (20%). Compared to healthy volunteers, the proportion of Treg cells in peripheral blood of two groups before treatment was significantly higher (P<0.05). In contrast, the proportion of Treg cells in the peripheral blood of above-mentioned 2 groups after treatment was reduced significantly (P<0.05). In addition, compared to chemotherapy group, the proportion of Treg cells in the combined group decreased significantly (P<0.05). The further analysis found that the proportion of Treg cells in the peripheral blood of the 2 groups was not significant changed (P>0.05) in the patients with ineffictive clinical treatment, but the proportion of Treg cells significantly decreased (P<0.05) in the patients with effective clinical treatment.</p><p><b>CONCLUSION</b>DC-CIK immunotherapy can synergize or enhance the effect of chemotherapeutics, alleviate the immune dysfunction in MM; and DC-CIK immunotherapy combined with chemotherapy can elevate the clinical efficacy in patients with newly diagnosed multiple myeloma.</p>